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In One Person

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In One Person

By: John Irving
Narrated by: John Benjamin Hickey
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About this listen

A compelling novel of desire, secrecy, and sexual identity, In One Person is a story of unfulfilled love - tormented, funny, and affecting - and an impassioned embrace of our sexual differences. Billy, the bisexual narrator and main character of the novel, tells the tragicomic story (lasting more than half a century) of his life as a "sexual suspect," a phrase first used by John Irving in 1978 in his landmark novel of "terminal cases", The World According to Garp.

His most political novel since The Cider House Rules and A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving's In One Person is a poignant tribute to Billy's friends and lovers, a theatrical cast of characters who defy category and convention. Not least, In One Person is an intimate and unforgettable portrait of the solitariness of a bisexual man who is dedicated to making himself "worthwhile".

©2012 John Irving (P)2012 Random House AudioGo Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Fiction Tear-jerking

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All stars
Most relevant  
John Irving always seems to float around certain themes and images: in this book, he gives us a full, believable, insightful story about the long term development of non-conformist lifestyles, struggles to find identities, and the support and barriers encountered along the way. Fun, too, easy to read, and tightly written.

Fascinating account of developing persona

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Great narration.

Ah well 😁 not my normal subject matter but I have read all Irving’s books. Thought provoking, sad in parts, humorous in others. Great piece of work!

Memorable

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A prayer for Owen Meany has been in my top 5 for many years so I was instantly drawn to this latest book by one of my favourite authors and I was not disappointed. Once again he explores our ideas of gender, sexuality and family relationships with a cast of characters that are rounded and real. The book covers decades and, as in real life, not all the ends tie up a nicely as you might hope and with other authors would have turned into a Hollywood style ending that never happens in reality. Thoroughly recommend it.

John Irving does it again

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It’s no Owen Meany but it’s clearly an Irving novel. Europe, gender fluidity, family, New England, wrestling, death; love, loss, self discovery, novelist protagonist, teacher. It’s like a recipe, but, just like enjoy my favourite recipes, so too do I enjoy John Irving’s novels.

Enjoyable

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Any additional comments?

A very well narrated (apart from the German) but sadly mediocre story. Not one of Irving's better works. It rambles on and on without any apparent purpose accept to say that LGBTs (and Qs!) should be accepted in society. Hardly a novel observation. Ok, I'll be fair, I wasn't aware of the addition of the Q category. It seems like he was scraping the bottom of the barrel and found some scraps that didn't make it into Owen Meaney (for good reasons) and pasted them together. Either that or he found it necessary to indulge inand publicise his personal sexual fantasies. I can't imagine why audible have this in their catalogue instead of Garp, Cider House, or really any of Irving's other novels (which I really wish would be in the catalogue). Must have been going cheap. If you're new to Irving, don't start here! Get Owen Meany or Son of the Circus which are both great.

Pointless ramble

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Several characters at the beginning of the book are repurposed from Owen Meany but if you push past that it's a really good, enthralling book

Complex but lovely book

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What an incredible story of one boys long unusual brave life. A brilliant story well told and beautifully written.

An epic story of one boys life

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I struggled with this story to begin with... it seemed to follow the plot of 'a prayer for Owen Meany' - a book I truly love, but after a short while the story deviated from what I thought I would be listening to and started off o a completely different tangent. this is a wonderful story of a boy and his journey discovering his sexuality and who he really is....,

a nice long listen

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If you could sum up In One Person in three words, what would they be?

If I could sum up In One Person in three words I would say - Top Three Irving.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

I cried through a lot of this book

Very good Irving

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At times confronting, amusing and even indifferent this 70 year journey through the evolving world of gender and sexuality in the so-called civilised world, with so much invested in a his and her stereotype will ring bells of memory and concern. Dive in

Challenge yourself

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